The most amazing achievement of the computer software industry is its continuing cancellation of the steady an... — Alan Kay

The most amazing achievement of the computer software industry is its continuing cancellation of the steady and staggering gains made by the computer hardware industry.

Author: Alan Kay

Insight: Every few years your phone or laptop gets dramatically faster hardware—processors that should make everything snappier, smoother, more responsive. Yet somehow your apps feel just as sluggish as they did three years ago. You're not imagining it. Software has a sneaky way of expanding to consume whatever speed gains hardware throws at it, leaving you with the same frustrating experience wrapped in more powerful machinery. This happens because writing efficient code is hard and expensive. It's easier to just add features, run heavier frameworks, and let the new processors handle the bloat. We've optimized for developer convenience and quick releases rather than user experience. The paradox is that more power often means more waste—we're like someone buying a faster car but filling it with increasingly heavy cargo until the ride feels the same. The real sting is that this pattern persists because nobody's directly punished for it. A company that ships bloated software on cutting-edge hardware still works fine. But the user sitting with a three-year-old device? They feel the full weight of progress that actually made their life slower. It's a reminder that technological advancement isn't automatic—it's a choice about what we prioritize, and we've collectively chosen convenience over efficiency.